Some SWVA communities see younger population stabilize
In Southwest Virginia, the trend of outmigration among younger people appears to be slowing and even reversing in some counties. The decline in the population aged 25 to 44 in Wise and Lee counties has slowed during the first half of the 2020s compared with the early 2010s, according to University of Virginia Weldon Cooper […]
Return to uncertainty
In the wake of the Federal Reserve lowering interest rates by half a percentage point in September, the stock market has been setting records, hiring numbers are trending strong, and the inflation rate has been slowly edging downward. Nevertheless, many businesses — and workers — seem to be in a state of anxious uncertainty, awaiting […]
Owens & Minor leases new HQ in Henrico
Henrico County is getting a fifth Fortune 500 company. Global health care logistics and supply company Owens & Minor is moving from Hanover County to a new headquarters in Henrico’s Innsbrook Corporate Center. The company is leasing the fourth floor of the Highwoods One building at 10900 Nuckols Road, according to Will Bradley, an executive […]
Making the office cool again
It didn’t take long for Spurrier Group employees to want to be back in the office after the pandemic began. Within the first four weeks of workplace shutdowns in 2020, the women working at the Richmond-based strategy and media-buying firm started asking CEO Donna Spurrier when they could return to the company’s comfortably fashionable office, […]
Talking telework
SHAWN AVERY President and CEO, Hampton Roads Workforce Council, Norfolk Prior to the pandemic, did Hampton Roads Workforce Council allow hybrid or remote work? We allowed employees to occasionally work remotely [due to] extenuating circumstances, such as car trouble, sick family members, etc. What is your policy today, and how is it working? Last year, we […]
Here to stay
Rachel Miller spent half of her undergraduate studies and then a portion of graduate school learning remotely behind a computer screen. Even the first job she took that aligned with her career goals — completing contact tracing during the COVID-19 pandemic while she worked toward her master’s degree in public health — was a remote […]
Change management
Hands down, the most unintentionally funny of the alarmist stories about remote work must be the June “news” articles warning that by 2100, teleworking would result in a generation of obese, hunchbacked, prematurely aged people with swollen eyes, their hands permanently stuck in clawing gestures from using a mouse. Lest you worry that your great-great-grandchildren […]
Serving a repurpose
In Alexandria’s Old Town North, a collection of three brick office buildings built in the 1980s is being transformed into Tide Lock, a community of 234 luxury apartments and condominiums featuring Potomac River views and space for retail and a nonprofit music school. And last summer in the city’s Alexandria West neighborhood, tenants began moving […]
Innovation, capital key to rural growth, Barkin and Warner say
There’s hope for economic growth in rural areas despite their challenges, Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond President and CEO Tom Barkin and U.S. Sen. Mark Warner said Wednesday during the Fed’s 2023 Investing in Rural America conference in Roanoke. Rural areas could overcome economic development challenges, particularly housing shortages and lack of broadband access, with innovation, [...]
Getting meta
Twenty years ago, artificial intelligence seemed like the stuff of sci-fi films such as “2001: A Space Odyssey” and “The Matrix.” Today, it’s so ubiquitous as to be virtually unremarkable and unnoticeable — integrated into everything from GPS traffic navigation apps on our phones to smart devices in our homes to security scanners at the […]
Hitting home
“The stereotypical view is that every young lawyer wants to work from home,” unlike their older peers, observes Victor O. Cardwell, principal and chairman of Roanoke-based Woods Rogers Vandeventer Black PLC. Indeed, 51% of baby boomer attorneys report being eager or very eager to get back to the office, but just 22% of their millennial […]
Virginia companies weigh office returns
Many companies in Virginia are taking a flexible approach on whether employees must return to work in offices or continue working remotely or via hybrid models. For instance, Capital One Financial Corp., the McLean-based credit card company, is planning to reopen its U.S. offices in a hybrid model on Sept. 6. Capital One delayed its […]